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What Are Parents (and Big Tech) Doing to Their Children?
The supermarket checkout now follows kids everywhere, and the ‘seduction’ is only getting more intense.
We have watched as the scene plays out in front of us in supermarkets throughout the world. As if working independently of the brain, a child’s hands race back and forth over the junk sold near the cash register. Parents fight the battle. “No,” echoes through the supermarket — “Pleaaaasse” — and finally the explosion. Sometimes the parent explodes — “I said NOOOO (eyes bulging)” — or the child loses his marbles and falls to the floor for the classic tantrum.
Fortunately, my son has never had that tantrum, but he does whittle away at our patience when requesting all kinds of junk that he usually would never ask for. Marketers, however, have spent hours figuring out how and what to place in that crowded space between checkout lines. The gauntlet is brutal, but if you can make it to where you are packing your purchases, the child’s attention usually shifts from that crap to other things. Maybe he will plot a new, more effective strategy for the next time. My son learned that if he didn’t ask for anything, he stood a better chance of being rewarded with some random item. On the occasions I don’t pick something up for him, he reminds me that he didn’t ask…
